


Allowance for Doubting

by samalander



Category: Jurassic World (2015)
Genre: Animal Death, Consequences, F/M, Post-Canon, Raptors
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-12-19
Updated: 2015-12-19
Packaged: 2018-05-07 14:26:56
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,488
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5459735
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/samalander/pseuds/samalander
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>After the disaster, Claire has to atone, and Owen has to know what happened to his animals. They return to the island one last time.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Allowance for Doubting

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ladyoneill](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ladyoneill/gifts).



> Title from "if" by Roger Kipling;  
>  _If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,_  
>  _But make allowance for their doubting too_
> 
> Happy Yuletide, ladyoneill! I got you some angst, and some dinosaurs, and I hope you enjoy them!
> 
> (And, as always, thanks to E and S for the betas!)

Claire Dearing had met Owen Grady when he first arrived on the island, and she wasn't a fan.

Sure, he's good looking, and he knows his way around the assets. But there's something about him that sets her on edge-- something about a man that spends his time in the dirt, in the muck and the thick of things, that Claire could never totally understand.

She was an observer. Sure, she acted. She proacted. She ran a whole damn amusement park full of prehistoric monsters. But her world was one of power; control rooms and air conditioning, and almost everything about Owen Grady ran contrary to her nature.

And the fact that he had waited more than three days to tell her that the raptors were laying was utterly unacceptable.

"Which one is it?" she demands, stepping out of her car into the humid air. There's a stench to the place, a smell of things that have died. It's not an uncommon smell on the island, but Claire still reacts to it viscerally every time.

"Blue," Barry says, falling into step next to her. "We waited until we knew for sure. The others-- they share the brooding."

Claire blinks at him as she mounts the stairs to the walkways, following the sound of Grady's voice.

"You two," she says, not glancing at Barry, "should know better."

"We know a lot of things," Owen calls from across the enclosure. How he’s heard her is a mystery, but he did, and he's apparently primed to sass her.

The raptors below make one of their sounds, and it sends a shiver down Claire's spine. Like nails on a chalkboard, she thinks, but older. 

"But not that it's protocol to inform HQ immediately if procreation occurs?" she demands, her hands on her hips.

Owen stares at her across the expanse, his face stony. Claire doesn't budge. He called her out here- finally- and he can close the gap, or he can yell. There's no way she's taking another step.

The moment between them is cold, but Claire feels it in the pit of her stomach-- there's something about this mess of a man that she finds interesting, she thinks. At most. Finally, with an obvious squaring of his shoulders, Owen sets off around the perimeter towards her.

His stride is measured, precise, and she wonders if he's always walked like that, or if he learned to hunt prey from his charges in the pit below.

"It's Blue," he says, when he reaches her. "She's the one laying."

Claire nods. "Right. And how many has she laid?"

Owen's gaze doesn't leave her eyes. "Twelve."

She takes a measured breath, trying not to react to how green his eyes are in the afternoon light.

"Protocol is to take them out of the nest," Claire says, finally breaking their staring contest to glance down. "Replace them with fakes and deliver the real ones to Dr. Wu. We don't want any genetic material floating outside of our control."

"You want to go in there?" Barry asks, and it's all Claire can do not to jump at the sound of his voice. She'd honestly forgotten he was there, too caught up in her little private drama with Owen.

"That's a job for ACU," she says, smiling at him. He means well, she knows, but he has too much of Owen’s swagger under his skin. She knows the type. If she gives these men an inch, they'll take the whole island. And that means not reacting to their goading.

"ACU doesn't go near my animals," Owen says. "And besides, there's another problem."

Claire raises an eyebrow as she turns back to him. "Another? Funny, you didn't mention that in the memo I got."

"Blue's in love," Barry sing-songs. "She's got a big crush."

"I'm sorry?" Claire asks, feeling her eyebrows arch towards her hairline.

"She's regurging," Barry laughs, nudging Owen, who seems to be blushing. "Every time she sees Grady, she gives him a little present, you know?"

The idea is repellent, if Claire is honest. The larger carnivores tend to reek of decay as it is, and the thought of one vomiting its affection at her-- or anyone's-- feet makes her stomach turn over.

Claire swallows her disgust and peers down below them again, watching one of the assets walk almost lazily across the diameter of the pen. A sentry, she thinks. Watching and waiting for a chance to attack. "Is it still eating?"

"Like a champ," Owen says. "Just-- she seems to have decided I'm her mate."

"So," Claire tries not to let too much of her exasperation fall into her voice. "You're telling me that we have an asset that is laying, displaying mating behavior, and might not be absorbing its lysine. Is it healthy?"

"Nothing wrong with her," Barry shrugs. "Nothing a date with her boyfriend here wouldn't solve."

Claire takes a moment, studying Owen. "Observe," she says. "I want reports once a week."

Barry nods, but Owen seems to set his jaw. "You know, it helps. The mating behavior. They're-- it's like a hierarchy. Their social system. There's an Alpha at the top. So getting her to accept me as one of them-- it's a chance that I'll be that Alpha."

The idea of Owen as the Alpha of the pack is why this research is happening at all. She knows that, but history has proven more than once that her knowledge doesn't preclude men's condescension towards her. He's supposed to bring the assets to heel. But she remembers the stories, the way the raptors had torn apart the first park. The words of Tim Murphy's memoirs aren't easy to forget, the way he described the cold terror of being stalked in the kitchen of the old park, of watching the doorknob turn. These assets are dumber than the ones they bred there, but they're still dangerous. Still smart and fast and vicious. This project is dangerous, no matter what Owen says about imprinting.

"You're not a dinosaur," Claire says. "Will they accept authority from you?"

"Yeah," Own shrugs, like it's not a valid question. "I bring food. That's a loyalty bond right there."

Doubt stabs Claire, hot in her gut. Maybe he's right; maybe these assets do feel loyalty. But something is telling her otherwise, something feels wrong about the situation.

"Observation," she says again, turning to walk back towards the steroids and trusting the men will fall into step with her. "Try to get the clutch away from them. And--" Claire glances back at Owen. "And Mister Grady, let's you and me make a plan to sit down together. Maybe Saturday?"

He makes a surprised noise, which she can't help but grin at. She gets a thrill out of surprising the men who think she's so simple.

"Eight?" he asks, when he gets his wits back.

"Eight," she agrees. "My assistant will call you with details."

She doesn't hesitate, doesn't give him time to change his mind. Instead Claire listens to the clang-clack of her shoes as she descends the staircase to climb back into her car.

She has places to be.

* * *

He wears shorts.

She prints an itinerary.

He orders tequila.

She makes an excuse about an early meeting.

They don't talk much after that.

* * *

There is fire and there is death, and Claire can barely catch her breath between running from one asset or another and trying to figure out how she's going to spin this to keep herself out of jail.

Owen has a hotel room, it turns out, and he takes her there after they leave the triage center. It's quiet and remote, and she turns her phone off before curling up on one of the beds and sleeping for what she hopes is the rest of her life.

It's not, of course.

He takes her to a place on the corner for coffee.

"I don't want to check my email," she says softly, her phone heavy in her pocket. "I don't know how this is going to go."

He nods slightly, taking a bite of a danish. "It's not gonna be good."

"The people who are at fault are --"Claire swallows. "The people who should bear the blame are dead."

"Yeah," Owen agrees. "And you're the highest person in the Park hierarchy left. So. What do you do?"

"I--" She closes her eyes, the dread of what comes next hot in her throat. "I think I have to go back to the park. Survey the damage."

Owen nods. "Blue survived. She's--she’s out there, without a pack. I want to make sure--" He looks away, unable or unwilling to meet her eyes.

Claire hesitates before reaching across the table and taking his hand.

"So we go back. We make sure the place is shut down, and stays shut down. And we make decisions about the assets."

He shakes his head. "We?"

"You know them," she breathes. "You're technically dating a raptor."

For the first time since this all began, Owen smiles. It's thin, barely there, but his eyes crinkle a little at the corners. "I am her mate. I think- I think that's why she turned on the Indominus."

Claire nods and fishes her phone out of her pocket. "I'm going to turn this on," she says. "And there are going to be at least a hundred emails. I'm going to make three phone calls-- one to Zara's fiance, one to my sister, and one to Richard Weisner, who will be the interim CEO of Masrani. And we'll do the rest from there."

* * *

The rest never materializes, because in the time Claire was sleeping, global stock markets began collapsing like dominoes.

Masrani Global had a finger in every pot, and when the settlements start rolling out for the people who were injured and the families of the dead, investors flee. After the Jurassic World Incident, the company goes under. 

The job loss is unprecedented. The economic turmoil is worse.

Claire watches it all from a series of hotel rooms, Owen by her side and her cell phone attached to her ear as she tries not to panic.

Costa Rica shuts down access to the island. Two more months pass, and Claire is called in front of Congress to justify her actions. The story is rote. She followed Mr. Masrani's orders until they became unsuitable, and then she grappled with Hoskins. Owen backs her up, and Gray and Zach.

No one can find Wu-- he's presumed dead. No one knows what happened to his research, or if the animals are alive. There's talk of napalming the island.

She is bombarded with civil suits, as if Claire was ever in charge of anything more than a few drones in a control room. As if she didn't save the day by getting the Rex out of her paddock.

Everything is a holding pattern. The world is gone to shit, and Claire is at the center, unable to move and unable to act.

She feels like she's drowning, and the only thing keeping her afloat is the man in her bed, steady and warm. For the first time, Claire needs someone, and she hates herself for it.

* * *

The nightmares don't stop. She can smell the blood and the flame, feel the dark, double-lidded eyes as they watch her move. She shivers in the warm room. Death is coming. She shares this room with death.

She wakes most nights covered in sweat, Owen's hands secure on her shoulders. "It's a dream," he whispers, kissing her forehead. "Claire. You're dreaming."

* * *

Claire is put on trial; first the court of public opinion, and then in front of the UN and Congress.

The hearings never end, ceaseless rehashings of the events in the park. She tells the story until it doesn't mean anything. She watches the security footage of Zara's death more times than her sanity should allow, and every time she feels the same nauseous, sea-sick feeling at the panicked screams. 

The media calls her every name in the book. Pundits call for her to be imprisoned as a traitor. Newspapers pontificate on nature of fault in the corporate world. Her sister isn't taking her calls.

The man in the senate who runs the hearings is stern, and tends to talk to Claire like she's a child. She hates him more than anyone, excepting herself. 

Sometime in the middle of the sixth long month of hearings, he lays out satellite pictures.

"Ms. Dearing," he slimes, like she needs to be coddled. "These are surveillance of your park."

"Not my park, Senator," she says, for what feels like the millionth time.

"Can you identify these structures?"

Claire glances at the photos. She can identify the structures. "It's the old park," she tells him. "That's the Jurassic Park Visitor's center. It was set to be renovated after the unveiling of the Indominus, made into a memorial."

Senator Sleaze nods, and hands her another picture. "This is the same structure, with heat signatures."

"Okay," Claire shrugs. She can't dispute that.

"We had the foremost expert on dinosaur behavior analyze them," he says, leaning forward. There's something in his eye. "And Dr. Grant believes that what we're looking at is a nest. A Velociraptor nest."

Claire keeps her face steady. "Yes?"

"Ms. Dearing. You told this committee that the dinosaurs couldn't breed."

Claire sighs. "No, sir. I told this committee that I was told the dinosaurs couldn't breed. As we've established, Dr. Wu could have made any number of changes to the genome without my knowledge. And, if you remember, the assets at the initial park showed an ability to adapt to single-sex environments."

There is muttering in the room, the kind of low buzz that always seems to emanate from the assembled folks when she admits ignorance.

"We need to know what's going on with this island, Ms. Dearing."

She shrugs. "I can't agree more, Senator. I've been saying from day one that you need a team to go in and do recon. The assets should have died off without the lysine contingency."

They've gone over and over this. It's old hat. The only thing keeping the pterosaurs on the island, Claire believes, is a genetic inability to survive the trip to the mainland. But there's no telling, if the Raptors are breeding, what a few generations of mutation could do.

"So we're asking you," the Senator says, his shark eyes glinting in the light of the chamber. "To go back. And tell us what kind of mess you've made."

His words sting-- not the accusation that she's to blame.That she's pretty used to by now. But there's a dark fear that settles in her stomach when she thinks of going back, of running through those same jungles, of seeing her park-- her hard work-- abandoned and overrun.

She doesn't say any of that. Instead, Claire nods. "I'll need people," she says. "And equipment."

* * *

It takes three months of convincing the Costa Rican government that Claire is not a criminal for the expedition to get approved. She gets her funds, and her team. She gets Owen.

"There's no one else who knows the assets like you do," she says perched on a hotel bed next to him as she tells him about the mission. "And if we run into yours-- I think you're the right man for the job."

Owen's eyes are big and expressive, but sometimes there's a darkness in them that frightens Claire. A sort of looming feeling that he isn't telling her something.

"Hey." She touches his shoulder gently. "It's been a year. Almost a year. You-- you don't have to go. But I do."

Owen makes a soft noise. "Do you think Blue is still out there?"

Claire shrugs. "I don't know what's out there. But something is."

* * *

The air on the island is muggy, humid and thick as the helicopter descends onto the control room pad. The stench that greets the team as they disembark is worse. 

One of the marines sent to supervise them crosses himself and spits. "Ma'am," he says, shaking his head. "This place smells like shit."

Claire doesn't respond, opting instead to survey the park in front of her.

She expected more decay, though that's probably foolish. It's only been a year. Still, she can see the murky water of the Mosasaurus tank even at this distance. It must be dead. There's no way it could have eaten since the Indominus. She feels a pang for her unlikely savior, but she tries to shake it off. It's likely that all remaining assets will need to be terminated, anyway. There's no place for them in the modern world. No way that dinosaur and man can coexist.

"It smells like decay, Dean," Owen says to the marine as he wraps a bandanna around his face. Probably to keep off the flies. "A lot of big things died here."

Claire shivers. A lot of little things died here, too. A lot of people. She's lived with that for a year, the dak memory of her sorrow as she sat in the belly of the ferry, keeping watch over the tiny, insignificant humans in tiny, insignificant body bags all the way back to the mainland.

She takes a deep breath to swallow her panic. "Let's see what still runs," she says, turning on her heel-- and yes, she's wearing sneakers this time. And shorts. She knows better. Now.

* * *

The marines lead the way, sweeping the dusky hallways of the control center before Claire and Owen enter. They're here to protect them, she hopes, but she knows they might have to make other choices. They all might have to make choices.

There's nothing between the helipad and the control center, and Claire slides into Lowery's seat with a sense of homecoming.

The systems that come on line aren't much, but they're enough. There are assets out of containment all over-- which is only fair. Containment as a concept hasn't existed in a while. The count is wrong, and there are life signs that are unaccounted for-- things the park system reads as life, but has no way of categorizing.

"Rex is still alive," Owen says softly, pointing to a spot to the north of the island..

"That Rex will never die," Claire says. "She's too tough. We avoid her, though. If we can."

A few alarms sound, beeps and boops that Claire knows by heart. "We've lost all the Apatosauruses," she says, softly. She knew it before. Sat at the head of one as it died. But somehow, seeing the screen makes it more real. They're all gone.

The head Marine-- Chambal, she thinks, and she knows he has a first name, but no one has offered it to her-- steps forward and gestures to the readout. "Where's the nest?"

Claire punches a few buttons, pulling up the abandoned visitors center, the part of the jungle that's closest to the river.

"Here," she says. "But the cameras are out. There's a short in the line somewhere. It happens."

Chambal shakes his head. "And what about the birds?"

"The Pterosaurs are territorial," she says. "They don't like interlopers."

Owen coughs slightly before stepping forward and laying his hand on Claire's back. "If Blue is in the center, then that's her turf. The Pteros might be nearby, but they're not on top of her."

His hand is hot, and she can't help but stiffen at the way he's touching her-- it's too familiar by half, and there are people who are watching them.

"What do you suggest?" Chambal asks. "And you should know we're not going into enemy territory blind, and you're not going without us. First rule."

"They're not enemies," Owen snaps. "They're animals."

"A bear that wants to eat me is my enemy," Chambal growls. "No different than a dinosaur or a person."

The tension in the room hangs. Claire knows, despite the men facing off, what's going to have to happen. What was always going to happen. "We all go in," Claire says. "We have an armored vehicle. We can get it close enough to the river, and then--" She swallows. "And then Owen and I will go in."

Chambal shakes his head. "No. No, ma'am. We've got drones. We get recon first."

His plan makes sense. It makes a lot of sense. And Claire has had entirely enough of people dying on this island, people dying when she's supposed to be in charge of things.

"Why are we here?" Owen breathes. "If they're doing this with drones? Why do they need us?"

She makes a soft noise. "They don't," she whispers. "This isn't a mission. This is a punishment."

* * *

The drones go out, and four marines hold their breath along with Claire and Owen as they begin to survey the situation.

"Treeline approaching," one of the pilots says. Claire wonders what his name is, who he is when he's not on stupid suicide missions to dangerous islands.

"Proceed," Chambal says, his eyes glued to the screen.

The drone enters the canopy as though it’s nervous about what it might find. All the caution in the world doesn't help, though, when the attack comes.

Later, Owen will describe it as a flurry of claws and jaws. Chambal will use military language about combatants, like it was a battle and not a Dimorphodon taking down an encroaching machine.

But in the moment, all Claire sees is red, the same hot, clear panic that she felt on Main Street when she was watching the same beasts attack her guests. Attack Owen.

"Fuck," she hisses, causing a few heads to snap in her direction. Like they've never heard the word before.

"Send in the second drone," Chambal intones, his voice steady. Claire can see the beads of sweat that are soaking into his starched collar, and she imagines that he's as tense as she is, that the same radiating worry is engulfing him. Or maybe he's hot.

The main screen switches to an aerial view of the forest, the canopy of leaves thick below the hovering drone. "Take her down slow."

The pilot obeys, lowering the drone into the foliage, where it snags.

"Sir," he says, glancing at Chambal. "The trees--"

"Too thick," Claire offers. She could have told them, had she been consulted. "So, do you have a third toy to send in, or are we doing this on foot?"

Chambal curls his lip, obvious disgust on his face as he considers his options. He has the Marine move the drone a few hundred yards and try the top-down entry again and again. The exercise in futility seems like it will never end as the drone snags and sticks in on the same twigs and branches from every direction.

"You," Chambal snaps, pointing to Claire. "Show me the vehicle."

* * *

They're kitted out in riot gear, the face shield reflecting Claire's breath back into her eyes and fogging as the armored car rattles across the uneven terrain.

"Are we going to disarm a bomb?" Owen asks, but his voice isn't exactly steady. He doesn't want to do this. He doesn't want to face the Dimorphodons. Claire smiles at him kindly, reaching out to touch his back, where the claw-mark scars are still pink and angry under his shirt.

"A little bit, yeah," she says, doing her best to channel her sister, put some kind of nurturing sense into play.

It doesn't work. She just sounds flat, fake. But Owen responds to her touch, if not her words, and he grins bravely. "Okay," he says. "A dinosaur bomb."

The vehicle stops, and Claire's stomach drops.

"This is us," Owen says. "Our stop."

The doors open, and Chambal offers Claire his hand. She knows the plan. She, Owen, and Chambal wait here, wait low, while the others head downstream and draw attention. She just hopes they don't draw the wrong kind of attention. There are still Metriacanthosaurus in the jungle, along the river, and Pachys that might charge.

None of this is safe.

And maybe it never was. Maybe they were just fooling themselves with the illusion of safety, like an airport. Maybe that's why people came.

"Hey," Owen says softly, as they crouch in the tall grass. "You with us?"

Claire nods as the armored truck pulls away. She's not, really. "Remember the first time we went to the visitor's center?" she asks, her voice wobbling.

"Our second date," he says, smiling at her. His left eye twitches slightly, and Claire suddenly tries to remember when the last time she saw him sleep was.

"This'll be easy," she breathes. "In and out. See if there's a nest."

Owen nods once before the commotion starts-- the Marines in the truck are firing into the air, driving away and honking. It's enough to stir up the Dimorphodons that are doing border patrol, and a small cloud of them rises out of the jungle. 

"Now," Chambal says, and they run for the trees.

* * *

The world is different in the jungle-- it's cool and dark, and the strangeness seems sharper, somehow. Claire pauses to listen to the noise of the animals around her-- there's a low hooting that she thinks is a Microceratus call, and the squawk of what has to be juvenile and infant Pteradons. It's old, the noise, and yet young. Something she should be used to.

"This way," she says, waving the others forward. They're staying off the tourist road that the park put in place, as per the plan, hoping that if the assets use the cut trail as a game path, they'll avoid predator detection.

The sounds of the other Marines fade as they move forward. Claire wishes, for a moment, that she were religious and could offer them a prayer. Maybe the one called Dean, the one who crossed himself, was taking care of that. But she’s still hoping for as few sharp teeth as possible.

The walk to the center isn't long-- they should be able to complete it in ten minutes. But the dense undergrowth and the bulky protective gear slow them down, and the initial cool of the jungle has given way to a creeping heat, the kind that makes the armor chafe and Claire's face mask fog to opacity. She flips it up so she can see, deciding that anything that attacks them can just eat her damn face, so long as she can know it's coming. It's nearly half an hour slog before the structure emerges from the trees.

"There," Claire breathes, like the other two might not have seen it.

Owen shushes her gently, holding out a hand. And it isn't hard to see why. On the front steps of the center, something so obviously man-made and modern, stands a raptor, peering out into the trees. The juxtaposition of the two make Claire feel oddly dizzy. 

The asset is smaller than any of the ones Claire remembers, and more brightly colored. It's almost tiger-like, its body covered in a mottled kind of orange feathers with stripes across its back, a dark brown pigment that could almost be black.

"What?" she whispers, glancing at Owen. "What is that?"

He smiles, something in his face that Claire thinks might be coded as _rueful_ in another person. "That's a male," he replies, his voice muffled by the mask. "And I think it's Delta."

 _Delta_. It doesn't surprise Claire that another raptor had survived the fight-- they were tough. Hard to kill. But to see the asset like this, clearly displaying secondary sexual characteristics that it hadn't possessed a year ago, brings everything into relief.

"She's not a she anymore?" Chambal asks, shaking Claire from her reverie.

"No," Owen replies, inching slower.

His movement must set something off, because Delta snaps to attention, his dark eyes scanning the treeline before tossing back his head and barking a warning.

The bark barely has time to fade into the air before Blue appears, her distinctive patterning somehow starker in the shade. She and Delta stand together, waiting for another move. Claire holds her breath, waiting for something to happen to break the tension.

"What do you see?" Chambal whispers. 

"No juveniles," Claire responds, turning to look at him. "You?"

Chambal's face slides to a mask of horror as Owen shifts again, standing and removing his helmet in one movement.

The raptors spring to attention, growling low.

 _Oh,_ Claire thinks, her head oddly clear. _So this is how I'm going to die._

Owen takes a step forward, into the clearing, his hands out in a deferential posture. She's seen it before, when he used to train them. Blue stands up, her eyes never leaving Owen, and barks another noise.

"Hey, girl," Owen says, his voice calm and low. "Remember me? We used to be pals."

Blue growls, but it doesn't have the menace of a few seconds before. She drops her head and clicks a few times. Owen nods and circles to the left. "Right," he says. "It's me. No one who's gonna hurt you."

Blue makes another noise, one more like the hooting Claire heard before, and she watches with her breath tight as a few juveniles emerge from the shadows of the building.

"Hey," Owen says, his voice a smile. "You got yourself a family."

Blue takes a step towards him. 

"This can't--" Chambal starts, but Claire holds up a hand. 

"He needs this," she whispers with a certainty she doesn't feel. "He knows what he's doing."

The dance is alien-- dinosaur and human circle each other in slow measured movements for what feels like a lifetime as Claire and Chambal wait, crouched in the undergrowth.

Finally, when her legs are screaming and Claire thinks the greeting might never end, Blue tilts her head back and makes a few hollow bass noises before tipping forward and vomiting, squarely on Owen's shoes.

"Hey," Owen smiles, the most genuine happiness Claire has heard from him in the last year. "I love you too, okay?"

Blue blinks at Owen, the same frightening intelligence she showed when she teamed up with the Rex to save their lives. "I'm sorry," Owen says softly. "I'm sorry I left."

Something shifts-- the wind, or a mood, and Blue straightens, her head turned from Owen.

"Okay," he says, nodding at the juveniles and Delta. "I get the hint." Owen never turns his back on the assets, opting instead to pull his facemask back over his head and back into the trees.

* * *

They have to wait another half hour for Delta to change his position enough that they can leave. Claire thinks that if someone wanted to torture her, this would be a great system-- faced with deadly animals, forced to stay still or die. It's the most fucked her mind has felt since she found out the truth about Santa.

But finally Delta does shift, and they're able to slowly pick themselves up and start moving through the jungle again.

* * *

It's a miracle, Claire knows, that any of the reckless plan worked. The men in the truck survived, and they're able to rendezvous at the prescribed place in Gallimimus valley. The truck did run afoul of a few assets, but it was Ankylosaurs and not Pachys, so they could outrun them.

Owen doesn't speak on the trip, his face inscrutable. Claire sits with him in the back of the truck, his hand in hers, as she tries to offer what little comfort she can.

* * *

Somehow, the mission is a success. Chambal will get a medal, probably, for being the only man to ever bring an expedition to Isla Nublar with zero casualties.

Owen doesn't speak for a long time, staring out the window of the helicopter that takes them off this island until they land on the carrier group that launched the chopper. She holds onto his hand as they slip below decks, seeking out a quiet place to talk.

"They're going to wipe them out," he says, his eyes bright with tears.

"Yeah," Claire nods, meeting his gaze. "They might."

"I don't-- why?" His voice is soft, young and broken.

"Because it's not safe," she tells him. He knows, but she tells him anyway. "Because nothing we did on that island was safe, or smart, or good. Because it sucks, but those animals shouldn't ever be able to escape. And if we don't stop them, then we're complicit in any-- any more deaths they cause."

"Yeah," he sighs, though he doesn't sound convinced.

"I'm sorry," she tells him, like it could ever help. Like it could ever undo the wrongs that have been perpetrated by InGen and Masrani and every damn fool who signed off on the park. The wrongs perpetrated by Claire.

"What do we do now?" he says, and Claire's heart breaks for him.

She lays a hand on his cheek before leaning in to kiss him gently. "We stick together," she tells him. "For survival."


End file.
